Connect-Bridgeport's 2020 Top Feature Stories: #2
By Jeff Toquinto on January 04, 2021
Sami Wilson's name is familiar to Connect-Bridgeport.The former Bridgeport High School athlete was part of the Lady Indians volleyball team which captured the 2019 Class AA state championship. On June 20, the news was shared of her end-stage kidney failure and the fact that she was on the transplant list for a new kidney. The community has rallied behind Wilson, who has endured a trying year as the search for a kidney match took place. She was scheduled late in 2020 for the surgery, but it was subsequently canceled. We will continue to follow her journey. Read Jeff Toquinto's story, which has been selected Connect-Bridgeport's #2 Top Feature Story of 2020:
At just 19 years of age, Bridgeport High School alumna Samantha “Sami” Wilson has certainly gotten plenty of the things she has wanted through hard work.
Wilson has graduated high school. She has been accepted and was a student this past year studying biology at Fairmont State University. And what many may remember, is she accomplished what so few student-athletes want – she captured a state championship.
The talented Wilson was a member of the Indians’ first-ever state championship volleyball team. She was a libero her senior season as the Indians upended perennial power Philip Barbour in the title game to bring home the hardware.
All those things, and so many more, she wanted were achieved through hard work. There is something else she wants right now, and that want may be a little surprising for those who know the highly outgoing and athletic Wilson.
“I want a kidney,” said Wilson.
What Wilson wants this time is something hard work will not achieve. For the first time in her life, she is going to have something she wants given to her.
The truth of the matter is this. Samantha Wilson’s wanting of kidney is trumped by something far more serious. She NEEDS a kidney.
This vibrant young lady is currently in end-stage kidney failure with both of her kidneys. Not long after diagnosis of her issues at UPMC Children’s Hospital of Pittsburgh, it was determined that she not only needed to start dialysis, it was determined she needed to be on the transplant list.
“Right now, her kidney function is between six and eight and it is supposed to be around 119. If you have a range under 20, the process for transplant begins,” said Samantha’s mother Kim. “She’s currently undergoing dialysis to help with those levels.”
Three times a week – Monday, Wednesday, and Friday at Fresenius Kidney Care in Fairmont – Sami Wilson heads to Fairmont for dialysis. The process last four hours each time to help keep her kidneys functioning until a donor is found for a transplant. Before we get to that, it is important to know how this young lady got to this point of needing help.
The date when things changed in a manner no one anticipated rings clear in Kim Wilson’s head. It was March 1 and she and her husband Mike were in Huntington to help cheer on the Bridgeport wrestling team at the state tournament.
The family is related to the Courtney family, who coaches and whose son Addison wrestled until injury forced him out. They are also related to state champion Zach Frazier of Fairmont Senior.
“We’re there Sunday night and it’s amazing how quickly things changed. We didn’t have a care in the world and were having a good time,” said Kim.
At around 11:30 p.m., the first step of news arrived. Sami had gone to the emergency room in Bridgeport with her boyfriend with major stomach pains.
“The pain was pretty severe. I could barely walk going into the hospital. I had a feeling that it was cyst. I knew how bad (my older sister) Danielle was with her cyst and the pain she was in and that’s what I though I was dealing with,” said Sami.
After talking to their daughter, they decided with it being late and with the thought being that it was a cyst, they would stay the evening and return early in the morning.
“We knew she was in good hands,” said Kim. “Then, we get a call in the middle of the night saying they were keeping here overnight at the hospital.”
Bloodwork had returned from the lab. It indicated a few very concerning things; most of it pointing to issues with the kidneys.
“What they told me I quickly researched, and it indicated kidney failure. We immediately got on the road,” said Kim. “When they told us they were going to admit her to UHC, they also said the tests showed her kidney function levels at 15. Doing the research again it looked as if she was in kidney failure.”
Although 19, the Wilsons had a long history with UPMC Children’s Hospital. Their daughter Danielle, now 21, had been there while battling lupus since age 8 and Sami was still young enough to go. And so, they took her to Pittsburgh.
“We got right in and they started trying to figure it out. They determined it was end-stage kidney failure,” said Kim. “They didn’t know why. They said sometimes there is no known cause, which this appears to be the case.”
That March, they were in Pittsburgh for a week before being sent home with medicines and be assured efforts would be made to get Sami Wilson on the transplant list.
“They told use we would be back soon for an evaluation,” said Kim.
On April 8, they were back for the evaluation at UPMC. They met with transplant surgeons, doctors, nutritionists – anyone that had to do with the transplant. They discussed her case. They worked with the insurance. They did extra tests and CT scans.
“It was not long ago, on June 3, when they said her levels were going to worse and determined she needed dialysis,” said Kim.
Two days later, Sami Wilson was in surgery. She had a dialysis catheter put in and as soon as surgery was complete dialysis began because her levels were critical. And that leads us to her current thrice weekly treatments, taking medicine to help regulate a multitude of things, including Sami’s blood pressure.
It also leads us to something else.
Kim and Mike Wilson, along with Kim’s sister Debbie Huffman, will soon be getting tested to see if they are a match to donate a kidney. If that does not work, even with Sami Wilson being on the donor list, they do not want to take what could easily be more than a year to find a match from a national donor.
“We’re going to try and go the living donor route,” Kim said. “If there’s a living donor match, then it’s a quicker time to get a kidney to her.”
The living donor is family. And here is where you come in.
It can also, if needed, be you.
Here soon, I hope to be able to tell you on this very Web site that there has been a family match. That would be the best-case scenario. If that does not transpire, the next scenario would involve someone from the community who knows Sami Wilson or who may not know her, but is willing to be the person to forever alter and, perhaps save, the life of a youngster.
How do you do that? You register by clicking HERE. It is a five-minute process that asks what organ you are willing to donate and, specifically, who to. From there, the testing process can begin.
Let us hope doing that is unnecessary. Just to be safe, keep it in mind until such time as it may be needed. Until then, keep doing what is keeping Sami Wilson’s spirts up.
“My family and friends have been right here by my side as I’ve been going through this, and everyone keeps checking in on me,” said Sami. “I’ve also had so many people sending me cards, messages and things like that. Those things make me excited to get this behind me, get my energy back and be back to myself again.”
Sami Wilson wants to be back in school. She wants to be able to enjoy summer, swimming, Tygart Lake, being on a boat and having fun on the jet ski. She wants to be exactly like she was just prior to March where taking a shower was routine and washing her hair was not a process.
Those are all the things she wants. She will soon be able to do them. To get there, she needs is a kidney.
Be on standby Bridgeport, Harrison County, West Virginia and beyond. A young lady may soon need you.
